Land funding deal to jumpstart Commonwealth Games athletes’ village
The West Midlands Combined Authority is to award more than £20m to help assemble a package of land paving the way for the development of the new Athletes Village for the 2022 Birmingham Commonwealth Games.
In order not to delay the £370m accommodation scheme, work is already taking place to assemble the land needed to accommodate the new housing.
Today’s WMCA board meeting is set to approve recommendations that £20.075m grant be allocated to Birmingham City Council so that it can proceed with the land acquisition programme needed for the scheme.
As the land in question is brownfield, the WMCA funding will be channelled through the Brownfield Land and Property Development Fund (BLPDF), which is designed to invest to secure new housing, industrial and commercial development. It is currently made up of allocations from the £200m WMCA Land Remediation Fund, secured from Government as part of its first devolution deal.
The BLPDF supports the delivery of key strategic projects by derisking private sector investment and addressing a number of challenges including market failure, adverse ground conditions, poor infrastructure, abnormal site remediation costs and providing gap funding to bridge the viability shortfalls on schemes.
As part of the deal which secured Birmingham the 2022 games, there was a requirement from the Commonwealth Games Federation that an athletes’ village be constructed, ready for occupation by athletes, officials and event organisation staff between April 2022 and August 2022.
The village (see below) will comprise 1,226 residential units and provide temporary accommodation for 6,510 athletes, coaches and team administrators. But once the games are over, it is proposed that the units will be redeveloped to provide a variety of one and two-bedroom apartments as well as four-bed townhouses.
Once the redevelopment has taken place, units will be disposed of as follows:
• 717 apartments for the sale on the open market
• 453 apartments, occupying four blocks, offered for sale to the Private Rented Sector; and
• 56 townhouses retained by Birmingham City Council as part of the Birmingham Municipal Housing Trust, to be let as social housing.
The WMCA grant would be refunded from the proceeds of the sale.
Birmingham City Council intends to fund the costs of the scheme through a variety of different borrowing/funding options.
A report to today’s board meeting states: “The WMCA Investment is intended to be used to fund acquisition, relocation, remediation and demolition costs which are required in order to assemble the site.
“As part of this site assembly a replacement facility for a bus depot is required plus financial support in contracting an alternative site for the Education Funding Agency (EFA) to construct a new secondary school and the cost of refurbishment to buildings on the EFA-owned campus.”
The delivery of the athletes’ village is entirely conditional on the provision of the £143.5m Housing Infrastructure Fund grant, which is likely to be shortlisted this month with final approval expected later in the year.
“However, given the tight deadlines required to deliver the village, the land acquisitions and initial remediation/groundworks must be commenced ahead of final Housing Infrastructure Fund funding approval and therefore there is a risk that the delivery of the village will remain uncertain until the Housing Infrastructure Fund decision is finalised,” adds the report.
The boundary of the 2022 Commonwealth Games athletes’ village, which will be in Perry Barr
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